Weekend Reading: The Still Coughing Edition

I went to the doctor today for a previously scheduled check up, and came home with new prescriptions and a new plan for getting my asthma back under control... let's hope it works! In the meantime, I'll just be here, coughing.

Despite the weirdness of my health this week, I got a fair amount done. I don't feel too bad going into the weekend, although I think I will write myself a short list of things to do this weekend. I have a manuscript I'd like to finish editing and a couple of contracts to turn around. The price of having the freedom to take it easy this week to celebrate and recuperate is that I'll do a little work this weekend. I'm happy with that trade!

However, I will also continue to take it a bit easy, because I need to be actually back to full strength soon.

But that's neither here nor there. You're here for links, so let's get to the links.

First of all, from several different sources... here's a story about the coming of open carry to public universities in Texas.

I can't bring myself to talk much about Trump, but this article from Jamelle Bouie might make you feel a little better. I think we all need to do our part to make sure Trump isn't elected. I see no reason not to take him at his word and assume that a Trump presidency would be very dangerous to our democracy.

I think his candidacy has already wraught changes that we'll be reckoning with for awhile. I notice a much more open nature to the racism that has always been present here. Maybe it is a good thing. Maybe it will make those of us who don't usually run smack into this racism notice it more and try to fix it. Maybe we'll finally lance the boil, as it were. Or maybe we're in for a really ugly period. Or maybe both. I don't know.

And maybe we'll learn that we aren't that special, that no one thinks their country is about to slide into fascism or what not before all of the sudden it does, and that our democracy and freedom is no more guaranteed than anyone else's, and we'll think a little more carefully about what actually makes a good, fair, and free society. (Hint: it is not guns.)

Anyway, moving on.

Joan C. Walsh puts the Hillary-vs-Bernie thing in the larger context of what happens to women as they advance in their careers. It is worth your time even if you're sick of the Hillary-vs.-Bernie thing, because it will tell you more about what happens to women in general.

The graphic in this tweet is really interesting:

Always check whether unpaid labor is being distributed fairly. Do not ever assume. Check, discuss, rebalance. pic.twitter.com/lAeFmkbOg4

— Naomi Clark (@metasynthie) February 24, 2016

I lack any context for this tweet, but I love it anyway:

"NO, Mommy! I no sit down with dinner! I pirate of the high cheese!"

And then she literally ran away with the cheese, shouting "yo ho ho."

— Kate Cox (@KCoxDC) February 22, 2016

This is a really cool article about the interplay of sound and music in ancient churches. I want to go hear the angels' wings. When I first visited Europe and went into some of the really old churches, I was really struck by how different the atmosphere felt in them. I do not believe in God, but I was impressed by these buildings people had created to glorify God. A lot of terrible things get done in the name of religion. I think it is worth remembering that some really beautiful things get done in the name of religion, too, and that these things can have meaning even if you don't believe in the religion.

I've said it before, but I'll say it again: I share more random cool things like the above on my Annorlunda Books facebook page, if you're into that sort of thing. Also on the @AnnorlundaInc twitter account.

And that's all I have this week, because coughing. Also, politics have consumed all my feeds, and I can only take so much of that.

Happy weekend, everyone!

Celebrating and Appreciating

Today, I decided to take some time to celebrate some recent milestones and goals achieved. I had three things to celebrate:

• The publication of Love and Other Happy Endings (on sale now at your favorite online book retailer!)
• The completion of the online seminar version of my Take Control of Your Time seminar (you can still buy the recording!)
• The crossing of a milestone in number of people signed up for my Founding Chaos newsletter (feel free to sign up!)

So, I did what I've decided to do to celebrate my achievements in this business venture... I went for a walk on the beach. It is a beautiful day here in San Diego today, so I got to go barefoot and get my feet wet.

Nice

I also collected shells, as I usually do on these walks. Here was today's haul:

Today's shells

I'll let the kids pick 2-3 each, and the rest go in my "success jar." Here's the current status of that jar:

Previous day's shells

All in all, a good day.

As I walked, I thought about how unbelievably lucky I am to get to live this way right now. You better believe I appreciate it.

I also thought about how much I enjoy giving seminars like the one I gave today. Before the seminar, I'm always nervous, and at least partly convinced that I have nothing useful to say. Then I give the seminar, and people ask smart, interesting questions, and I have fun, and they seem to appreciate the content... and there is a lesson for me there. I am trying to learn it. I'm also trying to find my way past my fears of self-promotion so that I can do more seminars and workshops. I've worked out a pricing system that seems right to me ($200 per instructional hour, plus travel expenses... get in touch if any of my offerings- or potential offerings!- sound like a match for your group.) I'm thinking of new online seminars I can do to build up my offerings. I am also happy to develop something custom, although the price will have to go up unless I get to keep the right to use the material elsewhere.

I have three (three!) books in flight for Annorlunda Books right now, which also makes me really happy. They are all great books, and I plan to write a post about them once I have all the contracts finalized. After I post this, I am going to dive back into editing one of them.

So, in short. Life is good for me right now, and I know it, and am grateful for it.

Not long after I got home from my beach walk, I got a call that reminded me that life is also unpredictable. My parents called to tell me that a good family friend has died. He was not old enough for this to be at all expected. I am shocked by this loss, and devasted for his family. I am reminded why I chose not to wait to try to live my life how I want to live it. None of us have any guarantees. Our family friend lived a life I would judge as "good." I'm sure he expected to have more time, though. His story is not mine to tell, but it is a powerful reminder to appreciate what I have, and to always take time to celebrate the good things.

Wishing you all your equivalent to a walk on the beach, sometime soon.

A Lesson Against Second-Guessing

This morning, I admitted defeat. I admitted I needed to go get a breathing treatment and prednisone. I'd waited just a bit too long to acknowledge this, and no longer felt like I should drive myself down to urgent care, so I waited for Mr. Snarky to get back from his morning errands, and had him drive me. This, of course, meant the kids had to come, too.

The closest urgent care in our health group network is down near Balboa Park, so Mr. Snarky and the kids took a soccer ball and spent some time playing. I spent a lot of time waiting. This, of course, gave me lots of time to second guess my decision to go to urgent care.

Once I finally saw the doctor, it was clear I'd made the right decision. She took one listen to my lungs, and said "you know what I'm going to tell you, don't you?"

Yes, I said. I knew. I was going to get the devil pills. She laughed at my name for prednisone, but told me that every asthmatic she sees feels the same way. I hate those pills. They make me jittery and give me an "amped up" feeling that makes it hard to sleep. And I think I'm shorter-tempered when I'm taking prednisone.

But... after one dose of prednisone and a breathing treatment, I can breathe easily again. I still have the cough that is the trailing end of this cold, but I'm not going into minute long coughing fits that leave me gasping for breath. I'm not having such strong coughing fits that they leave my head aching and make my chest feel like it will explode.

So, hooray for prednisone, I guess.

And let's pause for a minute and applaud the advances in drug formulation and delivery mechanism that mean my choice for maintenance meds to control my asthma extends beyond oral steroids, which is all asthmatics in my parent's generation had. I, on the other hand, have a choice of inhaled steroids and other medicines, which mean that I can usually keep my asthma under control without suffering through the side effects of prednisone.

--------------------------------

Now that I can breathe again, I find myself going back to how long it took me to go get the treatment I needed, and how I was second guessing that decision even as I sat in the exam room, waiting for the doctor.

There are probably a lot of things going on with that. I'm not going to work through it all, but I am going to take it as a sign for me to start trusting myself more. Because, lately, I've been second-guessing myself a lot.

I'm far enough removed from the things that made me decide to quit my full-time job and embark on a new path that it is easy to tell myself things weren't that bad, and to start thinking that I didn't need to take such drastic steps. But things were bad, and I did exactly what I needed to do to keep myself healthy, just like I did today.

I need to trust myself in that decision.

This new path isn't easy, but it is far healthier for me. Whether or not I ultimately succeed in building the business I am trying to build, leaving that old situation and believing in myself enough to at least try to reach for what I really want was absolutely the right thing to do, because it was what let me breathe again.

And really, hooray for breathing.

Weekend Reading: The I Can't Stop Coughing Edition

This week went buy in a blur of coughing. Petunia caught a little cold at school, and gave it to me. I wasn't feeling great over the weekend, but it wasn't terrible. Then, Monday night, I spiked a fever. By Tuesday, I had developed a cough. I took a sick day, but it was too late... the cough had taken hold, and I've been coughing what seems like non-stop ever since. Sigh.

My coughing is likely to be under control by next Wednesday's seminar (there's still time to sign up!) but I'll probably still sound funny. It seems like I get sick right before every online seminar or class I give, so that I always sound a little funny. Oh well!

Anyway, since I spent a larger than usual amount of time this week crashed on my sofa, I don't have that many links. But here's what I have:

There's new research about what happened to the Easter Islanders... and it turns out the answer might be "nothing," at least not until the Europeans showed up and gave them a bunch of new diseases. Visiting Easter Island remains one of my travel high points. If you ever get the chance to go, take it!

Modern Pacific Island challenges: Palau vs. the Poachers.

Keisha Bentley-Edwards argues we need to change how we teach African-American history: more context, less lists of firsts.

There was a lot of freaking out on Twitter about this health care story about data mining, but I think there should have been more about this story about how life insurance companies respond to genetic test results. There are a lot of ethical issues we should be working through in terms of our health data.

Also, Silicon Valley start ups that get into the health arena need to pay attention to the rules and stop trying disrupt their way around regulations.

I love this post about startups.

And that's all I have today. Back to crashing on the sofa in a coughing fit...

Weekend Reading: The Extra Long Weekend Edition

Our school district takes a four day weekend for President's Day. We made a deal with one of Pumpkin's friend's family: I'd take all four kids for Friday, and they'd take all four kids on Monday. Except then Petunia begged for a Mommy day, and I realized that (1) it is her turn for one, and (2) I had no idea when I'd get another chance to give her one. So Pumpkin is going to her friend's house on Monday and I am going to spend the day with Petunia. I always enjoy the solo kid Mommy days, so that will be fun. Even though she wants to go to Chuck E. Cheese.

So, anyway: I had four kids here today. I have also finally had to admit that the sore throat and headache I've had all week are a cold, not allergies. I managed to get some work done. This month's issue of Founding Chaos went out. I posted this week's Tungsten Hippo quote, which I find darkly inspirational:

"Being able to run is always better than having to stay and smile and offer yourself up." - Ken Liu in https://t.co/uTkxsrZDuv

— Tungsten Hippo (@TungstenHippo) February 12, 2016

I composed the Tungsten Hippo Weekly Digest for the week. It will go out Sunday morning.

I sent out a bunch of review queries for Love and Other Happy Endings. (Which, by the way, now has a GoodReads page.)

I thought I'd make significant progress on my current editing task when I took the kids to a park, but they interrupted me roughly every 3rd minute, so that particular plan was a bust.

And there are a couple of other things on my list that I didn't get to. So not a bad day, all things considered, but not a stellar day, since I'd already factored the likely kid-based disruptions into my to do list. Still, I think I am working on borrowed time and have decided to write this post a little earlier than usual, in case I crash or the kids start fighting.

On to the links:

Yesterday's post wasn't about my politics, but Sady Doyle wrote a post about Hillary Clinton and feminism and progressivism that is worth your time. I particularly love the closing line: "This is what it looks like when a woman stops smiling."

I've read a bunch of other things about politics, but I'll only share a few. Ezra Klein on how the rise of Donald Trump is a terrifying moment in American politics. John Scalzi on why mainstream Republicans have no one but themselves to blame for Trump. Matt Yglesias on Bernie Sanders as the future of the Democratic party.

And that's enough politics.

This story about a teacher shaming a child in a NYC charter school for not knowing the answer to a question is sickening. Those kids deserve better. I don't care how good that school's test scores are. If this is at all representative of how they treat kids, they are doing damage, not good.

Hey, look! I'm part of a new archetype! But seriously, it is a good article. Hat tip to @moink_tdr for sharing it with me.

"Kids don't kill women's careers, husbands do."

I haven't had a chance to read Marie Claire's big feature on women and guns, but I hope to get to it this weekend.

This post from Boing Boing's archives about the coolest locksmith shop is amazing. I want to visit! (After all, I visited the beer can house in Houston....)

Scandinavians have been fermenting fish for longer that we thought.

This is a surprisingly informative map of America:

Most Popular Valentine's Day Gift Searches Per State — https://t.co/nuVj4ucLbA pic.twitter.com/nHJIRtNBOH

— Mental Floss (@mental_floss) February 12, 2016

And on that note, I'll sign off. Happy weekend, everyone!